As is well known, vehicles, such as automobiles, are mounted with a bumper on the front and rear thereof as a guard against collision, but most of the conventional bumpers are externally plated metallic ones, so that these bumpers, although looking nice in appearance, have the problem of shock absorption.
Recently, in answer to the diversified requirements and regulations such as elevated safety standards due to the increase of traffic volume and speed, fuel economization by weight-saving, reduction of cost, etc., elastic shock absorbing bumpers have been devised which are light in weight and easy to manufacture, comprising essentially an external guard member made of an elastic material such as an urethane elastomer and a flexible internal member such as an urethane foam core. These elastic bumpers, although excellent in shock absorption, have the problem in that they are generally poor-looking, and in order to cope with this problem, proposals have been made for integral adaptation of a decorative facing such as a plated metallic facing or aluminized hard resin facing to the shock absorbing bumper. However, because of very limited elastic capacity, such facings, in the event of collision, cannot follow the same process of elastic deformation and shock absorption as the bumper, and may suffer plastic deformation with the result that the decorative design of the facing be damaged by only one initial collision, necessitating replacement of the entire bumper in spite of its normal functioning for shock absorption. Thus, this type of bumper had the problems of troublesomeness and inconvenience in manufacture as well as in maintenance.